Premium
The Structure of Genotypic and Environmental Covariation for Personality Measurements: An Analysis of the PEN
Author(s) -
EAVES L. J.
Publication year - 1973
Publication title -
british journal of social and clinical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.479
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 2044-8260
pISSN - 0007-1293
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8260.1973.tb00068.x
Subject(s) - psychoticism , neuroticism , extraversion and introversion , psychology , personality , big five personality traits , developmental psychology , unitary state , social psychology , political science , law
Phenotypic covariation for personality measurements reflects covariation due to both genetical and environmental influences. An attempt was made to separate covariation due to genetical causes from that due to environmental causes among the responses of 101 pairs of monozygotic twins to an 80‐item questionnaire providing scores of psychoticism, extraversion and neuroticism. At least part of the covariation of items known to load for extraversion could be explained by the unitary action of environmental influences. The same conclusion was reached with respect to neuroticism, but there was little evidence that environmental differences resulted in any covariation between the psychoticism items. Although genetical influences were more important in determining the relationships among the P items there was no clear indication that psychoticism was a unitary genotypic factor. The covariation of the N items, however, could reasonably be attributed to unitary genetical influences on neurotic behaviour. It was found that more than one genetical factor was probably involved in the determination of covariation among the E items, suggesting that the apparently unitary nature of extraversion at the phenotypic level could be due to environmental rather than to genetical influences.